[Sometime prior to March 24] 1949 | Location not indicated
Thank you for all the food and money and love and the tree; I give nothing in return for all I have is yours.
For some reason which I cannot figure out, I have been unable to tell you that I have been planning to follow the tour here in America with one in Europe. Maybe I hoped that the plans would fall through. I really don’t want to go. On the other hand, Virgil T[homson] and others advise it strongly. I will make enough money on the tour here to pay my way there. And so far there are a few engagements: one with the Brussels Radio, the French Nat’l Radio; Bob and Arthur would play my two piano pieces in Paris. This afternoon when Peggy Bate147 called it was to say that a Scandinavian tour can be arranged. Through Albers at Black Mtn. I have a connection in Switzerland, etc. Moreover, Gita Sarabhai148 will be in Paris at the same time.
I am deeply embarrassed that I am writing this news rather than telling you; I would probably have to be psycho-analyzed to find out why I haven’t been able to tell you.
Being away for a fairly long time, I will arrange to sublet the apartment, which I hate to leave.
So that for the time that all this will last, this touring, you will be relieved of the burden that I continually think of myself as being.
The French critic I met here is the most important one over there; he thinks my work the best he has found here. That ensures good reception of my work in Europe. I would rather stay here + compose, but on the other hand, I have a responsibility having made this music to let other people hear it. I don’t think of it as career-business, but only as a kind of duty. Once I am on the trip, I will probably love it. But I hate to leave.
To Mr. Kenneth Klein149
January 18, 1949 | 326 Monroe St., New York
Dear Mr. Klein:
Regarding our recent business connection, I am writing to say that although I have only gratitude and appreciation for the services of yourself and those in your office, I feel obliged, for the reasons listed below, to lodge this formal complaint.
1. Because of the incident familiar to you of my work of the last three years in connection with the Sonatas and Interludes is possibly lost, unless by luck and hard work I am fortunate enough to regain the exact preparation which I had carefully saved, and successfully, until the incident known to both of us. The audience on the second evening heard only an approximation of the sound intended.
2. The box office is supposed to open at 7:30 p.m. but each evening did not open until nearly eight o’clock.
3. Several of my friends told me that although they wished to pay for their admission to the concert they could not find anyone to whom to give their money either at the box office or upstairs. They obtained admission to the concert without challenge and later offered to pay me; how many others, not friends, entered freely, I have no way of knowing.
4. On the second night several people were informed at the box office that the house was sold out and that tickets were unobtainable except in the balcony (my mother was one of these), even though the orchestra was at least half empty.
5. Arrangements were made to have the lighting done between 12:00 noon and 2:00 p.m. As you know this arrangement was not maintained.
6. The tuner from the Steinway Company either did not tune the piano at all or [tuned it] badly, since before preparing the piano I found several notes in the upper register to be actually double tones.
7. What with the conversation of the ushers directly behind the door of the hall, and the passing by of many people in the corridors (no sign given them that silence should be preserved), plus the sound of singing nearby, to say nothing of the orchestra quite audible from next door, it is virtually impossible to hear music properly in the recital hall, even though its acoustics are “excellent.”
This letter is in no sense a demand for reparations, although if, from an objective point of view, you would feel it just to make them, I would in no sense refuse them.
To John Cage Sr. and Lucretia Cage
April, 1949 | Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Dearest Mother and Dad:
Your letter sent to Maggie Nogueira was so marvelous;150 it told absolutely everything and (she insists I call her so) brought the letter to the boat so that I read it even before getting off the boat. It was so marvelous (the only adjective I know now) to meet her; she is vitality itself. She arrived at 9 a.m. but it’s being April Fool’s the boat was very late (6–8 hours late because of fog which kept us sitting in the Channel), she made friends with an English lady on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Maggie is very beautiful + her accent and intonation reminds me of Peggy. We drove from the boat under a tunnel (river) (!) very much like the Hudson Tunnel, through Rotterdam, The Hague and finally Amsterdam. One city runs into another as in New Jersey. But of course Holland is beautifully flat and there are windmills and canals and some tulips already blooming. Because of the canals you often see boats sitting out in the fields; in Los Angeles they would be turned into Ship Ahoy restaurants because they are near the main highways. Almost nothing of the effects of war is visible since the Dutch are so neat and industrious: the utterly bombed-out parts appear now as parks and each city has large areas of building resembling our housing developments. Many people use bicycles and there are many flower-shops.
Maggie took us to her house and we drank Holland gin. Then her chauffeur took us to a hotel and she went to the opera. After the opera she had a supper-party at her house and we were there until 2:30. This morning I am up late and hoping that these 8 months or 7 will not be as packed with activity as these 2 days. Maggie has made all kinds of appointments, parties, etc., for us for the next days and wants us to spend August here with her in a house on one of the old canals. The whole experience is extra-ordinary and on the overwhelming side. We telephoned Peggy + and that was a pleasure and also a sadness that she was not here. And how often I wish you both were here too! You would love it so much.
The boat had its smoothest crossing in ten years. I was not at all ill. We met charming people: one who will arrange concerts in the U.S. zone in Germany. She is the wife of a man in counter-intelligence.
I have to hurry to lunch with Maggie. Will write soon again.
To John Cage Sr. and Lucretia Cage
April, 1949 | Amsterdam
Have just written a letter to Maro151 explaining about music and court arrangements and you can get that information from her. Everything has happened one thing after another. I have made connections here with the Society for Contemporary Music,152 and they will present a concert with Maro playing the Sonatas. I have met many composers and seen so much that is beautiful and to remember. Tomorrow we go to Brussels. I telegraphed to find out if they still expect me to play but there was no answer, so I do not know. The man who made the arrangements is very ill, so it may be that with a new Director I may not play. We will see.
I have also telegraphed ahead for reservations in Palermo, Sicily, and the address from April 20–30 is Villa Lincoln.
Via Archirofi 10
Palermo, Sicily
Italia
Peggy’s friend Maggie Nogueira has been marvelous to us, letting us use her car (with chauffeur),
